


Crimson and Gold

by mistrali



Category: The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
Genre: Extra Treat, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:15:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27326422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mistrali/pseuds/mistrali
Summary: A moment during their first autumn in the garden.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 13
Collections: Trick or Treat Exchange 2020





	Crimson and Gold

**Author's Note:**

  * For [m_madeleine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/m_madeleine/gifts).



> Dear Madeleine, I was so charmed by your prompts that I had to try my hand at writing one. 
> 
> This is on the lighter side of things!
> 
> Edited on Nov 2 (day after posting) - I’ve added in a sentence and made some minor edits for clarity.

The day the storm broke, Mary woke to blue-white, tattered-cloud skies arching over the moor. The morning was taken up with chores for Mrs Medlock, and arithmetic and reading with Miss Simmons, the new governess Mr Craven had hired (Colin, too, had tutors, but in subjects like biology, geography, calculus, Latin and fine arts, which were as foreign to Mary as Dickens). 

She scrawled down her last five long division sums, donned her coat and hat as quickly as she could and ran joyfully to Colin’s room, just as Mr Young was leaving. Hand in hand, with the haste of young creatures confined too long, they dashed pell-mell out of the gates and galloped through the orchards and along the ivied walk. It was so pleasant to be outside, with the delicious invigorating chill of the rising wind, that Mary quite forgot herself and raced ahead of Colin through the wooden door.

Then, out of breath, she stopped and stared. She had expected the garden to be as austere and brown as she’d found it that winter.

“Oh! It’s… it’s like a rajah’s tapestry!” For, overnight, the garden had transformed again. Leaves covered the trees, the top of the garden wall and the bare ground, in every shade of russet, amber, umber, burnt sienna, ochre, gold, turmeric, scarlet, flame-orange and dun imaginable. When she stepped on them, they rustled and crunched like twigs.

Impulsively, she bent and picked up a handful. “The Magic must make them change colour. Are they quite dead?” It seemed queer that dead things could be so beautiful. Yet as Mary turned over the leaf in her hands, she saw that it was smooth and golden on one side, and primrose yellow grading to a rich crimson on the other. Fascinated, she drew another one from the pile, and realised they were as different from one another as flowers were. 

Dickon, who was on his hands and knees digging with the trowel, looked up and beamed when he heard their voices. From the colour of his cheeks, which were even redder than usual, and the wind-tousled curls under his rough cap, he had been outside all day. For a moment Mary’s stomach swooped as Dickon’s wide blue eyes met hers.

“Aye,” he said. “Mother says as she couldna’ find more graidely colours in a paintbox nor a church-window. But the crocuses an’ snowdrops are wick, right enow. They’re asleep under th’ ground until th’ springtime.”

“The trees are asleep too,” said Colin, agate eyes shining with scientific conviction. “It is the Magic which makes them sleep and wake at the right time. Young said they keep the water in their roots, so the leaves go dry and change colour. The Magic does that too, although Young doesn’t know it.” Then laughing for sheer boyish delight, he knelt at Mary’s side, in search of beetles and ants’ nests under the damp clumps of leaf litter.

Dickon’s laugh rang out as mellow and rich as autumn sunshine. “Aye, indeed. We’ll make a fine gardener o’ thee yet, Mester Colin.”


End file.
